Diary of a writing, reading, animal loving, travelling Penguin and his mate who love collecting Penguin books, taking photographs and talking to people about Tasmania, Australia

Saturday, 29 June 2013

My Worst Week of 2013 so far.....

The old saying goes, "When it rains it pours." Well this week it absolutely pelted down. It stormed.

The week started well enough. Then Thursday happened and I noticed my little dog Molly seemed to have a tumour. Took her to the vet as it seemed larger than the week before. It wasn't a tumour. She was bleeding internally and she had been poisoned. Fortunately I was able to ring the vet before 7:00 am as the 'tumour' seemed to be spreading across her back. I had her into the vet by 8:00 am. Immediate treatment started, blood clotting tests (that she failed) and a whole body pressure wrap- she looked like a little mummy. Whew- got her in time. Then the vet said to me, "Okay go home and get your other four and bring them in. We need to test their clotting times."

I think I was in mini shock. Off I went and loaded up the other two dogs and the two cats (who are indoor cats and have an enclosure in the back yard). Brought them in and sure enough all of their clotting times were off. ALL of them had been poisoned. My animals are not free range. They don't leave the yard unless on a lead and I am with them. The cats live in enclosures because we have lots of native wildlife, birds and cars near us.

Rat bait but where did it come from. We would take care of that later. All of them were started on immediate Vitamin K and put into cages so they wouldn't bump themselves. It turned out they had access to the poison a good week or so in advance and their clotting times were affected but we didn't know it until Koko our cat and Molly our little madam silky terrier had a skirmish (as they do) and Molly got whacked with a cat paw that caused her to start bleeding internally.

More clotting tests at end of the day and slowly it was getting back to normal. Then everyone home for the night to be watched carefully. More medicine and in two weeks time all of them go through clotting time tests again and on it goes until the poison leaves their system. Bad news is there is a severe poison that is on the supermarket shelves now that can stay in their system for up to 150 days. So more tests coming up without a doubt. Did I also mention we are up to $1800.00 vet fees? Luckily they are insured so that will certainly help.

Then the detective work was to begin- along with all of this happening the landscapers I'd hired to do some work in our front yard decided to start work on Friday so lots of noise happening and dogs wanting to bark at them but having to keep them quiet. Then Australia going through a political crisis and I have to watch our new Prime Minister Mr. Rudd challenging and winning the top job from the Prime Minister I really respected, Julia Gillard, our first female Prime Minister. She has been bullied and treated abominably by both her own party and the opposition because she is a female, an atheist and lives with a man without the benefit of marriage. I have never seen Australian politics become so dirty. Embarrassing to say the least. I don't care who people support but when the country is being run on disgusting personal attacks as to debating policy I get really cranky.

Koko aged 8

So have spent the week caring for animals, cursing the television and the media for repeating themselves at least 6 million times on the same story and baking cookies for the landscapers. By the way they are doing a great job and I will have a level area in which to relax in my front yard instead of trying to read in a lounge chair that goes down hill that I slide off of.

I am reading. Started a book today as it is due for my Monday night book group. Fortunately it is only about 150 pages called So Long, See You Tomorrow by William Maxwell born 1908, American writer published by Vintage. Lovely cover too. Will do a separate post on it very soon. Will see how book club goes with it before putting up all our reactions to it.

So that was my week. Sometimes life just can't be about sitting under a tree in summertime reading a book. Besides it is winter here but a lovely winter now, quite mild. I hope everyone else had a much better week than I did.

By the way I did find out that the poison came from the next door neighbours who had rats in their attic and put down bait believing the rats would die in the attic and that would be the end of it. They had no idea they'd run out of their house and into our yard and cat enclosure for all the animals to dine on.
You can imagine how horrified they were after I spoke with them and told them they'd poisoned all five of our beloved pets and my poor T overseas visiting his ageing mother for her 90th birthday couldn't do anything but worry. But "all's well that ends well", another quote by my mother. My mother raised us with lots of cliches. So I am expecting my next post will have photo of a lovely book cover and some thoughts that are more literary than angst.

No funny that- just a "I feel really bad" and now they can forget all about it. Always lovely to hear from you Elaine...looking forward to the upcoming ashes... no doubt we can share the experience. haha

I have cats myself, so I understand how awful it is, having them sick, especially all at once - from poison! - and running up huge vet bills. I was very glad to see that they & you are recovering. I have to wonder at your neighbors, though - for lots of things really, but dead rats in their attic, by choice?

Evidently the rats got in during our recent cold snap somehow and then ate their way through their ceiling into their kitchen pantry. They had no idea though about the power of poison outside of just killing the rats and ending their problem. I can promise though that they now know a lot more about rat poison than they ever thought possible! haha Nice to hear from you Lisa.

Pam,How dreadful for you! I would not have made it through your week without becoming severely ill myself from stress. Brava to you for coping, surviving, getting to the bottom of the problem, and bravo and bravo to all your pets for making it through.

Thanks Judith- funny how we all cope with different issues. I'm always very good through the crisis and then collapse in a heap and feel sorry for myself at the end of it all once resolved so need nice books and lovely hot drinks around me which is what I'm doing today. Reading a lovely book - will post up soon and enjoying my Sunday lie in.

That is awful, Pam. How stupid of your neighbours to do that knowing there are animals nearby. Some rat poisons are designed so that the rats become very thirsty and have to leave the roof for water (and thus don't die in the roof). I hope that they are all 100% soon (and you too). [I too have found the treatment of JG absolutely appalling - what a week!].

How horrible, I'm so sorry to hear about this. The least the neighbours could do is offer to pay some of the bills. At least you'll kno0w which poison was used, I suppose. The lanscaping sounds lovely though. I'm about to have new windows & cladding installed & I'm not looking forward to the noise & mess but am looking forward to the result. No more painting, better insulation so lower power bills (fingers crossed) etc. I'll be thinking of all of you & hoping the next lot of tests are an improvement. Look after yourself, too, as the reaction to all that stress kicks in. By the way, you're right about the lovely winter. It's been a mild weekend here & if we could just have some rain (but not when the workmen arrive), I'd be happy.

Enjoy your renovations. It is always nice to have something done to one's property and I will have another little reading area which I'm looking forward to once weather is really good again. Interesting about the lack of interest to follow up their poison mistake with any vet bill contribution. I am fortunate though that I have insured all my animals so hopefully the insurance will pick up quite a bit of it. Thanks Lyn for your concern. Enjoy that mild Melbourne weather. Wonder how long it will last! :-)

Neighbours are young and evidently never dealt with poison before. But now the animals are well though ongoing testing for blood clotting times will continue for awhile. I really felt for Julia. She had more integrity in her little finger than the boys club had in their whole estates! But life moves on and now I'm just going to try and read a good book. Live somebody else's problems. haha Thanks Vicki for your caring comment.

Oh my word, poor critters. Hugs to you all and glad you are all okay now. How irresponsible your neighbours are, I can understand your cats possibly being affected by poisoned rats but all your dogs too? That's way too much poison kicking about!

Gosh, I have been really behind in trying to catch up on my reading of all my favourite bloggers' blog posts. So sorry to hear about your five furry ones' recent poisoning episode. Am glad they are all doing quite well now, and you can go back to enjoying some good reading over there. Do send my regards to the little troopers. :)

Thanks Michelle, yes they are all doing fine now after 6 weeks of treatment. Thank you for your comments. I have difficulty keeping up with all of the blog posts too as there are so many I really enjoy.